Monday, August 8, 2011

Save our town.

This Saturday, we made our third trip to the Zoar Ohio Harvest Festival. You can read more about our previous visits here and here.

I'm beginning to think that I'm cursed in a Charlie Brown kinda way. You know - "Everything I touch gets ruined." My favorite products get discontinued. Most of the significant landmarks from my childhood / coming of age have been closed or torn down. Now I find out this weekend that one of my favorite places, a little town that has been in existence for almost 200 years, is endanger of being completely leveled.

From the Save Historic Zoar webiste: The Historic Village of Zoar sits at the base of a levee constructed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) nearly 75 years ago to hold back potential floodwaters. The levee is in need of major repairs and the Corps has given it a “Dam Safety Action Classification I” rating — its lowest safety rating, meaning the need to address the issue is “urgent and compelling.” By law, the Corps must consider all options to fix the problem. Basically, there are three alternatives:

Repair the levee
Tear down the village and let the area flood
Relocate the Historic Village of Zoar to higher ground

More than likely, the option will be the cheapest alternative: Tear the village down.

Now I know that places like Zoar are not everyone's cup of tea, and that with the state of our country's economy, the use of federal funding is under more scrutiny than ever. However, the loss of this little village would be such a tragedy. There are so many ugly, rundown, abandoned buildings that are complete eyesores, yet they continue to stand because no one wants to pay to tear them down. Yet Zoar, with its quaint little buildings and beautifully landscaped gardens could be gone in the next couple of years. Unbelievable.

But let's keep positive by enjoying Zoar in the here and now. As usual, we stopped in the antiques tent first. I probably spent a total of ten minutes browsing this year. First of all, it was incredibly hot and crowded. Second, that's about how long Lauren lasted before she wanted to leave. Lastly, one of the sellers curbed my enthusiasm.

I've been photographing antique fairs for years now, and not once has anyone said anything to me about taking photos of their wares. Well, there's a first time for everything. So there I was, moseying about snapping away at things that caught my eye.

Like this bullfighter painting.

And these great old weathered store signs.

And these plump love pillows (Yes. I just typed that).

I guess Tribbles are now considered "primative" (Note the sign says in small print "Trouble with Tribbles").

Then the party ended when I started to eye up this carnival game. The scene went something like this:

Antique Seller Guy: You know you should ask before you take photos.
Me: Oh, I'm sorry! Did I take photos of some of your stuff? If I did, I would be happy to delete them (The Photojournalist's Credo: "It's always better to ask for forgiveness than to ask for permission.").

Now before we continue with this story, I'd like to point out that I was doing nothing illegal, and I only offered to delete the photos to be nice. However, in a public place where there aren't any signs posted about photography being prohibited, you can take photos of whoever and whatever you want. Otherwise, the paparazzi would be out of jobs.

Antique Seller Guy: I don't know.
Me: Well, is that yours (Points to carnival game)?
Antique Seller Guy: Yeah.
Me: So can I take a photo of it?
Antique Seller Guy: Yeah.

At this point, I'm trying not to snicker, and nonetheless I politely listened to his (true) stories about how people will take pictures of antiques and then try to scam people into buying items that they don't have on eBay. I didn't have the heart to tell him that if that was my angle, I would not be wasting my time and money by taking photos at an antique show, but would rather stay in the cool comforts of my home, searching for existing images on the internet and clicking "Save as." Mark just thought this was his way of hitting on me.

Moving along...

We ate lunch in the "brew tent."

Which was situated right next to the greenhouse, my favorite building in the town. I couldn't resist taking yet another photo of it.

Of course, we also always have a photo taken under the big tree in the middle of the town's gardens.

Each year, there are free wagon tours of the town. I don't know why we didn't take advantage of this in past, but Lauren insisted on it this year.

While we waited to be picked up, we enjoyed the company of Caty, a six month old Corgi pup.

Who Lauren quickly dumped to pet this cute, but unnamed kitty that was lounging on a nearby porch.

Finally, the Clydesdales arrived and we were off.

View from the wagon.

Lauren and Mark enjoying the ride.

After the wagon ride, we checked out the antique tractor display.

We also watched the border collie herding demonstration (No pics this year) and visited the exotic petting zoo. Here's something that you don't see everyday. It reminded me of the poem "Warning" by Jenny Joseph:

When I am an old woman I shall wear purple
And hang out with zebras.

Oh wait, maybe that's not how it goes.

And that concludes this year's tour of the Zoar Harvest Festival. Boy, that was a long entry - hopefully it makes up for two weeks of silence!